


Recode

by Dimity Blue (Arnie)



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Episode Tag, Episode: s02e02 Bad Code, F/M, Gen, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-11
Updated: 2018-04-11
Packaged: 2019-04-21 13:54:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14286372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arnie/pseuds/Dimity%20Blue
Summary: Cody Grayson doesn't know what to do now everyone knows he didn't kill Hanna.





	Recode

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for Bad Code (s2, ep02).

It's been a weird few weeks since Hanna was found under Mrs. Russell's patio and Cody doesn't really know how to handle it. The hostility and hate he faced every day have gone. Instead, the people in Bishop seem as confused as Cody on what to do. They can hardly treat him the way they did now they know it wasn't Cody who killed Hanna but Trent Russell. Yeah, goody two shoes Trent Russell who did so much for the town, the library, the children before some drug dealers from another county put a bullet in his head. A death no one had known he deserved. It was funny, if you looked at it from the right angle.

Cody has got pretty good at looking at angles since he was half-blinded in one of his beatings.

But now nobody's beating on him at all and Cody's not sure how to handle it.

He keeps on going to the Razorback because where else would he go? It took a long while - and a lot of beatings - for them to accept him in there but it'd got to the stage where he was mostly left alone unless one of the Freys came in. Now, though, now he's just as likely to get free drinks as he is a gentle, "Maybe you wanna cut back on your drinking a bit, huh, Cody?" Which is a confusing message to give anyone, he reckons.

Even the small jobs he used to pick up around town have been different. Before they found Hanna, Cody could scrounge up the odd job earning just enough money to put a few drinks in his hand, now people are calling him in and offering him jobs. Old man Tobias has even offered him a full time job becoming a car mechanic. It's like they feel sorry for all the years of beating him down and now they want to build him up.

Thing is, Cody deserved every single one of those beatings. Not for killing Hanna - he couldn't have harmed one hair on her beautiful head - but for not being there when she needed him. If only he hadn't listened to her pa and uncle. If only he'd followed her that night. He might have realised Mr. Russell was up to no good. He might have saved Hanna, kept her safe, and she would have looked at Cody with tears shining in her big dark eyes as he walked her back home.

Only, he hadn't. And Hanna died in Mr. Russell's car or his home or his garage and was buried under his patio with no one the wiser until over twenty years later.

Cody shoves his beer away from him and stumbles down off his barstool. He doesn't want to sit and think about how he failed to save Hanna. It seems harder now no one's making him pay for it.

"You okay, Cody?"

Cody shrugs the hand off. "I'm going home."

"You sure you can make it, Cody? You want someone to go with you?"

Cody isn't so blind he can't see half of them fixing to walk him home in penance for one of his back street beatings, and he doesn't want anyone near him while he's so close to breaking. He pulls himself upright and tries to straighten his jacket. "I'll be fine. I'm just - I need to clear my head."

As if he's found some magic words, they relax and let him go, though hearing 'goodnight' and 'you be sure to walk careful now' is strange after years of curses and wishes he'd die in a ditch. But then he's out and leaving the bar's lights behind him as he heads up the road towards his folks' house. Not that he's going home, not yet. His pa will be waiting up for him, like he's done for the past twenty years even when his belief in Cody was strained to breaking point. But his pa has waited up far later than this before now, so Cody ignores the turn off and walks to the graveyard where a new grave was recently dug in the plots where the Freys lie.

There's no headstone as yet but, in the half light just after sunset, it looks as if there's a statue by her grave, though Cody doesn't remember hearing about any statue. It's not until he gets closer and the statue moves that he realises it's a woman with long dark hair and, for one heart lurching moment, he thinks it's Hanna come to life again.

"Cody?"

It's not Hanna, though there's a familiarity that teases at him. Cody feels he should know her, especially here by Hanna's side. "Sam?" Her mouth widens in a familiar smile and Cody nods, sure now. Sam. Hanna's shadow who loved Hanna as much as Cody did. "You came to see Hanna." He doesn't ask; he knows.

"I wanted to make sure she was home. It's been so long."

"Yeah, they found her a few weeks back. Under the Russells' patio. The weird thing is, he was killed a good few years back. By drug dealers, they think." It's a long speech for Cody, seeing as he doesn't really talk to people any more, but Sam nods, and Cody has the weirdest sensation she knows everything - the Russells, the drug dealers, Cody...everything.

"Sometimes, the code erases itself."

"Code?" Cody doesn't understand, but Sam had always been clever, messing around on those computers and stuff.

She smiles again. "Take care of yourself, Cody." And then she leaves, walking away across the grass to where a dark car is parked.

Cody waits until she's gone, then sits by Hanna's grave. He feels settled, somehow. As though, with Sam, things have come full circle. He touches the flowers Sam left behind and rubs the petals between his fingers. "Old man Tobias offered me a job, you know. As a mechanic. My pa thinks I should take it - get a regular job like a regular person." Of course, Hanna doesn't answer him. There's nothing but the sounds of the wind in the trees and the birds that sing at night, but Cody nods and pats the grass at the edge of the grave. "Okay then, I will. Goodnight, Hanna. I'll come and see you again soon."

The end.


End file.
